


No Law Less Than Ourselves

by hopeless_eccentric



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Cuddling, Episode: s01e14-15 Juno Steel and the Train from Nowhere, Fluff, Other, Sharing a Bed, Sort Of, and there was only one bed, ish, juno mulls over a Lot Of Feelings, juno's embarrassing thing for nureyev's teeth, nureyev is pretty and i wont shut up about it, nureyev steals a Lot Of Bedsheets, this is pretty soft ngl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:48:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25758352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hopeless_eccentric/pseuds/hopeless_eccentric
Summary: The night before, he had slumped back into his apartment with the lights off and his priorities in order. A flimsy voice of confidence in his head proclaimed that Juno Steel was a changed lady, with no romantic history to distract him from what needed to be done. He had silenced the part of him resolutely stuck on Peter Nureyev for good, and wouldn’t ever spare him another thought.That plan had lasted all of fifteen seconds when he flipped the lightswitch and was met with a sight for sore eyes.
Relationships: Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Comments: 26
Kudos: 157





	No Law Less Than Ourselves

**Author's Note:**

> Title from We Two Boys Together Clinging by Walt Whitman. I'm gay. what did you expect. 
> 
> Content warning for mentions of hypothetical murder, mentions of betrayal

Juno really had to stop waking up next to Peter Nureyev. 

He didn’t really have any other choice, but two nights straight felt a little excessive. At least he had a decent excuse. 

The night before, he had slumped back into his apartment with the lights off and his priorities in order. A flimsy voice of confidence in his head proclaimed that Juno Steel was a changed lady, with no romantic history to distract him from what needed to be done. He had silenced the part of him resolutely stuck on Peter Nureyev for good, and wouldn’t ever spare him another thought. 

That plan had lasted all of fifteen seconds when he flipped the lightswitch and was met with a sight for sore eyes. 

Peter Nureyev leaned back against Juno’s second-hand recliner like it was a throne and he was the carefree boy king who sat upon it, not knowing the full gravity of his position, but certainly knowing the full power. 

His stance was as relaxed as it was practiced. Nureyev draped his arms over the back of the chair, shirt arranged and open to reveal his collarbone and the first few inches of his clavicle, while one knee sat atop the other. One of his heels, black and shiny enough to reflect Juno’s slack jaw back at him, rolled around in a lazy circle as he fixed Juno with a smoldering gaze. 

What struck Juno as odd was his choice in outfit. While he didn’t take Nureyev as the type to ever dress too casually, that open shirt and tailored suit jacket looked cut for a star of stream and screen. 

He grinned like a starlet too, at least at first glance. It was the kind of look that made your heart swell and your stomach do acrobatics, even if deep down, you knew it meant nothing. An empty, practiced expression meant to make you feel all funny inside. If practiced enough, a look such as that made you know you were being played and not care one bit. 

There was something underneath the smile that made Juno shiver, though he couldn’t tell if it was from fear or a sick excitement. 

Nureyev’s sharpened smile glinted in the lamplight, and it struck Juno exactly what had been so enticing about the glowing expression reeling him in from across the room. It looked almost hungry. 

The silence between them could’ve been cut by a knife. Instead, it was shattered by Nureyev’s voice, just as low and languid as Juno had remembered. 

“Hello, Juno,” he grinned. “It’s been a while.”

Juno hadn’t meant to fall asleep in the car, especially not with it being driven by a master criminal whose boss wanted him dead. Nureyev, or whoever he really was, had betrayed him once before. Juno couldn’t forget the taste of that kiss and the feeling of that gloved hand in his back pocket if he wanted to. He’d tried. 

However, Nureyev knew the destination and insisted that poorly rested detectives shouldn’t drive at three in the morning if they valued their own health and safety. Juno didn’t, but he was too tired to say no. 

He awoke to a hellsent cramp in his neck and a percussive cracking of joints when he jumped at the sight of Nureyev beside him. There was a long moment where he wondered if this was just another one of those stupidly pleasant dreams, but then his companion bid him good morning and started off on a displeased tangent about Juno’s “deathtrap,” and he was forced to come to terms with the fact that the man driving his car was a master criminal, and Juno had willingly handed him the keys. 

That had been almost a day ago, and the relentless onslaught of whatever it was about Peter Nureyev that killed Juno’s focus had yet to stop. He might as well have been pressing one of those dagger heels into Juno’s neck for as hard as breathing became. Then again, that mental image wasn’t doing much more to help. 

It certainly hadn’t helped that this new ‘Duke Rose’ figure had insisted on oozing domestic felicity. There was always some excuse to touch, from the cheek kisses to the squeeze of Juno’s hand under the table. It might have just been wishful thinking, but perhaps Nureyev was acting on more than just the urge to make Juno squirm. 

At the end of the day, Duke and Dahlia won. Juno scrubbed away his makeup and accused Nureyev of trying to murder him once or twice before bed, while Nureyev polished a scuff the carpet had left on his heels and rightly defended himself. 

Feeling the twist of guilt in his stomach, Juno finally went to bed next to a man who had already betrayed him once and was intending to use him as an accessory to a train robbery the next morning. Even though all his instincts told him to sleep with one eye open, he hadn’t slept since the accidental nap in his car the morning before. Maybe with a bed underneath him and a wanted criminal two feet away, he might be able to get a few winks in. 

Or at least, he intended to. 

“Goddammit,” he groaned, making a few halfhearted attempts to yank the bedsheets back to his side. Nureyev, however, seemed fairly tangled amongst what seemed to be an entire bed’s worth of blankets. “For once in your life, could you just not steal these?”

“It’s one in the morning, Juno,” Nureyev yawned, voice muffled beneath the piled comforters. The only part of him Juno could really see was the elbow that poked out to gesture at the nearby clock. “Go back to bed, detective.”

“Love to. I’d absolutely love to. But you see, I’ve got a little problem over here,” Juno growled, gesturing vaguely at his side of the bed. It wasn’t quite half. Rather, he’d rolled over to the far end, taking up a third or less of the mattress. While he doubted it would do much to prevent him being gutted in his sleep, he could pretend a few more feet of space between them would make his heart quit doing acrobatics whenever Nureyev said his name. 

“You’ve dug your own grave, my dear,” Nureyev murmured. 

‘What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

“Keep your voice down, darling,” Peter winced, sitting up. The sheets rolled away from his shoulders as he blinked and gave a bleary glance around. “Just because you’re keeping me up doesn’t mean you must wake the entire floor.”

“Oh, I’m keeping you up. I see,” Juno shot back, quieter this time. 

He’d never seen Nureyev without his glasses for that long, let alone outside of makeup and some variation on a three piece suit. His hair lay askew from the powerful hotel air conditioning, one lock laying over an eye when it would have usually been pushed back. He made a few futile attempts to blow it away before giving up and carding it behind his ear. 

Juno hated that a part of him wanted to move it for Nureyev, even if it was just an excuse for a brief and tender touch. 

The last time he’d had his hand on Peter Nureyev’s face, they’d been mid-kiss, and he was still relishing the feeling of Rex Glass’s heart pounding through his uniform while a hand slinked its way down the small of Juno’s back. Even though he knew better, he prayed the touch to be innocent. It wasn’t, of course. Nonetheless, the ache in his chest when he felt those keys leave his pocket still thrummed when he thought about Nureyev for too long. 

That ache returned when he watched Peter, fighting back a yawn, grope around the bedside table for his glasses. He had looked so dangerous perched on Juno’s recliner the day before, and even soft and domestic Duke Rose was dressed to kill. Literally, even. Juno hadn’t missed the knives tucked away within his jacket. 

However, the man before him was laid bare, without designer clothes or makeup or that cologne that smelled like spiced tea and nostalgia and the feeling of lips on one’s neck. Juno thought he was more beautiful than ever. 

He was forced to hide an embarrassingly smitten look when Nureyev fixed his glasses atop the bridge of his nose. Thankfully, the appearance of the frames stripped enough of the intimacy away from the scene that Juno became confident in his ability to speak once more. 

“Yes. I’ve pulled the sheets away from the last foot of the bed. This wouldn’t be an issue if you weren’t actively trying to fall off it,” Nureyev returned, snapping Juno from his stupor. 

“I don’t spend a lot of time sleeping with criminals, Nureyev.”

“Hm, well, we did get rather close before you went and put a damper on things,” he mused, a lazy grin crossing his face. It barely registered as the movie star quality Juno had seen before, as Nureyev had to break to yawn. 

It was cute. Why the hell did it have to be cute?

“You mean when I arrested you for theft?”

“Semantics, darling,” Nureyev said loftily. “Now, are you going to get under the covers or not? I can’t sleep with you complaining all night.”

“Nureyev,” he groaned, but his companion had already set his glasses aside and burrowed beneath the sheets once more. 

“I can’t hear you, Juno. I’ve chosen to be comfortable under all these blankets.”

“Fine,” Juno grumbled, rolled over, and tugged a handful of the sheets his way. 

“That’s the spirit,” Nureyev murmured. Juno couldn’t see his face, but could hear that he was smiling. He tried and failed to crush the wave of warmth in his chest at that thought. 

“If you gut me—” Juno broke off. “Well, fool me twice.”

“Of course I’m not going to gut you,” Nureyev pretended to gasp. “My knife is all the way across the room, and it’s far too cold to get up to go retrieve it.”

“Very comforting.”

“I’m sure it is,” Peter yawned. Juno felt the mattress shift beside him as Nureyev adjusted. 

He jolted when he felt Nureyev’s fingers, warm from the blankets, brush against his. Peter’s hand didn’t budge. 

It wasn’t unpleasant, all things considered. Such a minute touch couldn’t hurt. Besides, Juno was tired and that little point of contact was warm, and the man he still feared and adored in equal measure was already halfway to snoring. 

And so they fell asleep, almost hand in hand.

**Author's Note:**

> Nureyev's pretty and I'll never shut up about it. 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!! Make sure to smash that kudos button and stay hydrated!! Comment or I'll fuck your mom
> 
> Yell at me on tumblr @hopeless-eccentric


End file.
